The crowd cheered. A limousine arrived. It departed. There was nobody in it.

Wait some more.

A producer with a bullhorn, wearing a black cowboy hat, whipped the crowd into another frenzy. Ty Pennington raised his arms. The limo arrived. The Dickinson family disembarked. The bus moved, this time for real, showing family members their new home at 45 Mystic Circle in Beaufort.

When the bus turned the corner off Mystic Circle, the surprise for the Dickinson family was real. So were the tears.

Staff Sgt. Bill Dickinson watched live via satellite from Afghanistan where he has been deployed with Marine Aviation Logistic Squadron 31 since Nov. 5.

His wife, India, and their five children - Grant, 16; Briana, 14; James, 10; Robin, 8; Sophia, 1 - saw the 3,700-square-foot house in person.

The family was selected from hundreds of applicants. The youngest daughter suffers from respiratory problems.

H2 Builders of Hilton Head Island was the lead contractor of the project that was finished in 106 hours by volunteers working with donated materials.

IQ Air North America provided a "Perfect 16" air filtration system for the home, said company spokesman Joe Rookard.

Sophia "is going to be breathing well now," Rookard said. "The mold, which was her issue, will be filtered."

Shawn Custer of Bluffton of Southern Sign & Awning and his employee, James Nutt, were among the last workers out of the house before the bus moved.

Nutt said they had just finished a "skateboard room" for the Dickinson boys.

"We did graphics on the floor and walls," he said. "The floor looks like a street and there's a cityscape on the walls."

Custer said they had worked on the project for a week, first printing banners for sponsors and then "as the rooms progressed we were in each one."

Watching the television production from a nearby front yard, neighbors Brian Roach and Diane McCallie said they've had a week of sleepless nights but enjoyed the excitement.